Bangladesh's Agriculture Minister Abdur Razzaque has said that people in Bangladesh eat twice as much rice as people in other rice-eating countries of the world. He advised eating less rice to reduce demand for it.

He made the remarks at an event in Dhaka on Sunday. He said people in various countries eat on average about 200 grams of rice per person, whereas in Bangladesh the average is about 400 grams per person.

The minister also said the big challenge is to provide Bangladesh with nutritious, safe food.

But rice is the staple and favourite food of Bangladeshis, so most attention went to the "eat less rice" part of his remarks. Many people on social media made jokes, while others criticised him.

On the Facebook page of a leading Bengali daily, the news drew about 6,500 comments. One person wrote in jest: "Raise the price of rice a bit more and people won't be able to buy it anyway."

Another commented: "The rich eat less rice and eat cashews, dates, apples, maltas and various foreign fruits, plus beef, mutton and lamb. The poor have only rice and bread. If you don't let them eat even that, it will be hard to survive."

On the Facebook page of a private television channel, one person wrote: "Try working in the fields and see how hard farm work is. It is hard work, so we eat more rice."

Source: BBC Bangla. First published in Bengali on The Agro News.